


Poppies

by CrackingLamb



Series: Flowers For Fen'Harel [2]
Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Attempts To Make Thedosian Accurate Herblore, F/M, Hope, Magical Resurrection, Past Child Death, Past Relationship(s), Post-Canon, Post-Veil, Spirits
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-09
Updated: 2021-03-09
Packaged: 2021-03-16 01:21:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,023
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29942337
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CrackingLamb/pseuds/CrackingLamb
Summary: A decade after the Veil was lifted, Ellisora Lavellan is finally ready to find the lingering spirit of the Dread Wolf.  After all, she knows he's out there somewhere, she can feel him in her bones.Is love stronger than pride?Is memory stronger than both?Beta'd by Iron_Angel.
Relationships: Female Lavellan/Solas, Fen'Harel | Solas/Female Lavellan
Series: Flowers For Fen'Harel [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2202018
Comments: 10
Kudos: 18





	Poppies

**Author's Note:**

> A year ago today I posted a silly little Trespasser fix-it. I thought it was one and done.
> 
> I was wrong. 
> 
> This is a sort of sequel. It doesn't truly require that you've read the first one, but that's always nice, lol. (Please note the series tag.)

Ellia packed some food, a pair of daggers, a whetstone and an empty journal into the large pouch of her knapsack and ignored the dark look being thrown at her. She moved around the room, seeing if there was anything she'd forgotten. The books would stay, of course, well looked after in the Archon's library. She had no worries there. The collection of knickknacks from her various travels from Dalish hunter to Inquisitor to guest of what had ended up being the last bastion of human resistance against the Dread Wolf would stay too. Again, safely in the keeping of the Archon.

“I don't like it,” the man himself said.

“It's a different world than it was fifteen years ago, Dorian. I'll be fine.”

He sighed, still theatrical. His kohl lined eyes and artfully displayed graying hair did little to disguise his worry. “How do you know, how can you be so sure?”

“Because I can feel him, like a pulse under my own. I carried his Anchor for three years, it left a signature.”

“Every report I've ever come across says no body was found in the remains of Skyhold. Nothing could have survived the blast.” He said it as he had every time they discussed it, as if she was nothing more than an errant child, stubbornly insisting the sky was in fact orange, not blue. Never mind the fact that at sunrise and sunset, it was.

“I don't expect his physical body remained,” she said, as she always did. “That does not follow that he's dead.”

“You are impossible, my dear.”

She turned to look at him again, taking in the careful placement of his weight on his good leg, the rings of gold adorning each finger save the one that was dawnstone, the shimmer of polish on each nail. Robes of office couldn't hide what the years of war had done to him, although he carried himself as she did. Proud in their disability, daring anyone to speak of it and earn their collective wrath.

“You've known that for a good many years, Dorian.”

He laid down his final and most powerful card. “What will you tell Arva?”

Ellia paused, knowing he expected the jab to hurt. The fact that it didn't surprised him and she aimed a frown at him for sinking so low. “I've already told her. She's a woman grown. And she will remain with the clan as she finishes her studies.”

“She's 17,” he protested.

“And the Dalish are considered adults by then,” she reminded him. “She's taken her rites. She is the First of Clan Lavellan. She does not need me.”

“You are her mother,” he exclaimed.

“Dorian.” He sputtered for another moment, then sank into an overstuffed chair and stuck out his bad leg. Ellia crossed the room and lifted his foot onto a tasseled hassock, taking the pressure off it. “Stop worrying so much. She knows I have a better chance of finding him than anyone else. Did you honestly think I would hide such a thing from my own flesh and blood?”

“No, I suppose not,” he said grudgingly. “She does know, doesn't she?”

“That her father is the Dread Wolf? Of course she does. Dorian, he lived with us for over two years before he left.”

“Why didn't he stay?” he exclaimed, as he always did. With the same exasperation and frustration.

Ellia pinched the bridge of her nose. It always came back to that, didn't it? These words were a litany now after so many years. A place of recognized repetition that offered comfort as well as affirmation between the two old friends. “Because he's a wanderer. He was never going to be content to stay in one place, even...even for his family. Especially after...”

After arguments and ugliness thrown at each other as they were grieving. Words and actions they could never take back once they were unleashed. It had been a terrible tragedy and no one's fault, not truly. The world was dangerous for the Dalish, and Solas had learned that to his sorrow.

She had no idea how much of their loss had influenced his decision to go ahead with his plans. She had to assume it had, and greatly so. Mahanon would not have died from the Blight if he hadn't been living in the woods like a vagabond, after all. Isn't that what he'd said to her? No magic Solas knew had been enough to overcome the taint in their son's blood. It took him before his second nameday. And shortly after, Solas had left. A year later, he burned away the Veil and disappeared. Another year later, they learned that whatever caused the Blight to spread had ceased and it was decaying in the ground. In the last ten years, no one Ellia had heard of had gotten tainted.

The memories ached and broke through the dam she kept them behind. A looted ruin, a curious toddling boy, a shattered amulet that held Blight growth and infected him through the tiny cut the jagged edges had given him. Terror that it would spread. Keeping themselves isolated from the clan to prevent it. Arva's tears that she couldn't play with her brother. Silence in the dark of night as his last breath left him. A tiny pyre. A planted tree. The sight of Solas walking away.

Ellia took a deep breath and let it out slowly. Dorian was watching her carefully, his eyes downturned and mournful, knowing full well what she was remembering.

“Forgive me, my dear. I didn't mean to dredge up such things.”

“The past lies buried, Dorian,” she said softly. “The Dalish are pragmatic, and I more than most after the life I've lived. If nothing else, Mahanon's death caused Solas to root out the Blight and destroy it.”

“A silver lining, if one must be found.”

She nodded and stood up to go back to her packing. “I'll miss Tevinter, you know. Floating cities and hot running water and all the amenities I could ever dream of. It's been a long time since I lived on the road.”

“Where will you go first?” Dorian asked, finally accepting that she was going, it seemed.

“I thought I would start at Skyhold and see what's left of it. There may be clues, yet.”

“After a decade?”

“Magical ones, Dorian. Things only I would find.”

“I know I've trained you well, but do you really think you'll find something I didn't?”

Ellia held up her arm where long ago untamed Fade magic had burned her to the quick. Solas had managed to save her life, but not her hand. Cuffed near her elbow was an enchantment and the prosthetic it formed was as seamless as flesh. Most of the time, she could pretend those horrible days of recovery had never even happened.

“I have an edge you do not.”

Dorian arched an eyebrow at her before he looked away. He had no arguments left. Of all of them, he knew how hard she'd worked to get to this point and be ready. “Fine. Just, be careful and stay in touch.”

“Of course, Archon Pavus. I wouldn't want to break any diplomatic ties.”

He scoffed a rude noise, but then he laughed. “All right, yes. I've become a worrying hen in the last few years. Allow me the privilege.”

She shouldered her pack and bent to kiss his brow. “Of course I do. You and Bull are family. Now, I'll let you know when I reach the fortress. If I don't find him there, I'll probably be crossing into the network and the crystal won't work anymore.”

“I do wish we'd gotten that untangled.”

“I know you do. But if I need to go there, I'll check in before I reach...” _Mahanon's tree._

“You think he would have gone there? That's morbid.”

“If he's gone back to being a spirit, he will be drawn to the places where his emotions lay deepest. There were happy times too, alongside the grief. Just like Skyhold.”

“I know there were,” he said, conciliatory and contrite. “Ellisora...” She met his gaze and held it. “Come back in one piece, no matter what you find.”

“I will, Dorian. I promise.”

***

The bridge that spanned the chasm of the valley was intact, although the drawbridge had rotted away to nothing, leaving a gap between her and the home she'd once known. She focused herself and called up the energy of the Fade to make the air solid beneath her feet and stepped into the remains of Skyhold.

Tarasyl'an Tel'as no longer among the People, now it was only Tarasyl'an Laiem – the place where the sky _fell_.

Dead branches littered the courtyard and the leaves drifted across the once neat and tidy cobblestones. The curtain wall remained, although half the steps bore deep cracks and were weathered near to smoothness. She climbed them carefully. No remnant of the Inquisition was left, no banners or tents, no horses in the stable, no cheerful voices from the tavern. Glancing at the outbuilding, she saw every window had shattered. She wondered what kind of shape the Great Hall was in and she was glad she'd had the presence of mind to gather her other supplies elsewhere.

The doors were blasted in, the hinges melted. Wind had funneled debris along the floor nearly to the door that led to the War Room, but that didn't concern her too much. She wasn't here to sightsee. Her throne was still there, tattered and ragged after a decade of being exposed to the elements. There were spirits around her, she could sense them. They left her alone, however. She had no need of their re-enactments of memories here.

She turned to the short hallway that connected the keep to the rotunda and hesitated. Regret had made a mess of things once, although it had been subdued eventually. She knew it had been cleaned up, but she was apprehensive to see the murals again, just the same. Still, of all the places he might be lingering in a form that would give her a start, it was there. She straightened her spine, gripped the bundle of flowers in her hand tighter and forced herself to cross to it.

The rotunda was unchanged, for the most part. It was hardly pristine, and it was missing both the work area at which Solas had spent the better part of a year plus the susurrus from the upper level where Dorian had kept himself. But the walls were sound, the embrasure windows unbroken, the rafters whole. Now that the Veil was gone, and she had her hereditary magic running freely in her veins, she could feel the protective sigils placed in the stones themselves. They called to her, welcoming and constant and she stepped into the center of the circular room hardly with any forethought.

She stood in the place where once there was a soft rug and a table and a humming shard and a stack of books and a comfortable chair. She sank to the ground and looked at the mural. And she wept.

***

After pulling herself together, and telling Dorian she'd arrived safely, Ellia laid out her flowers from her bundle, side by side. A slim branch of felandaris, now so rare as to be considered extinct without the Veil. A sprig of dragonthorn for stability, a cutting of deathroot to cross over, prophet's laurel for steadiness, elfroot for strength, vandal aria for pleasure and two poppies for remembrance.

She shaved off a sliver of the felandaris with her dagger, knowing she didn't need the whole stalk. Then she layered the rest on top of it, a colorful pyre lit with a touch of magic. The flames burned hot and quickly, and the scent was overwhelming as the myriad fragrances competed with each other. When the pile had burned to ash, she lit it again, calling up the memory of it. It was harder now to call veilfire than actual fire, an irony she found humorous. But she managed and in the flickering green flames she heard the thrum of the magic that pulsed in her own veins. She had only to follow it.

She had burned one of her poppies to make this flame, now she laid the other one into the veilfire. It didn't shrivel and burn as one might expect – veilfire holding no heat and containing no properties like real flame outside of the Fade – but it released its delicate scent into the air, underscored with a heavy smoke she was careful not to breathe too much of in. And when she felt light and fuzzy, tethered to the waking world by only her body's mass, she closed her eyes and crossed into the Fade.

It was always disorienting at first, leaving her body behind so her spirit could wander. It was different from sleep, more tangible and _real_. She wasn't a Dreamer, so this had been her solution to overcome that. It had taken years of study and practice to reach a point where she could move about the Fade easily. Her ancient, immortal ancestors might have used magic as easy as breathing, but she and her modern brethren did not. Trial and error had led her to this combination of herbs. Research in the oldest remaining libraries of Tevinter and furtive trips to Vir Dirthara had helped her recreate the spell.

She looked around the dreamscape that was Skyhold now and saw it rebuilt as when she walked its rooms and corridors with the knowledge that she held the fate of the world in her hand. Literally. The mural was brighter here, another trick of Solas's she guessed, and the walls were whole and warm with life in them. The spirits around her took on the faces she knew once, but they stayed away. She knew they would unless she called on them. She looked down and saw her own physical form slumped cross-legged on the bare stones of the rotunda, both asleep and yet not. She cast a swift ward on the space, so nothing would bother her, not that she thought anything might. The waking version of the fortress was abandoned and empty. She hadn't even heard any birds there when she arrived.

Looking away from herself and back to the mural, she felt the pulse of Solas's spirit and moved to track it. It was stronger near the completed portion of the mural, but it trailed erratically. She tried to remember which part of the tale he'd told first and swung around to the tower of fire crowning the small representation of the Temple of Sacred Ashes where she'd absorbed his magic and fended off, however accidentally, the apocalypse Corypheus had intended.

She followed the tendrils of energy until they were all she could sense. They were formless, but strong. If she did this right, she could reform them into a wisp and remind it of its former self and sentience. Before, she'd had Cole to help her. They'd brought back Wisdom this way, at least partially. She in turn had taught Ellia how to further the spell, how to refine it to bring back memories as well as form. She reached out with her Fade self and began.

She gathered the tendrils as one might the threads of a tapestry, weaving them together so they knit together and thickened, becoming luminescent in the green light of the Fade. When she'd gathered them all, she cradled them as she might have a child, keeping their purpose intact without bleedover from her own emotions. It was hard, but she had disciplined her mind precisely for this moment, and she did not falter. The tiny spirit held steady when she released it and she stepped away from it, beckoning it to follow her as she found more bits to integrate to it. She kept it bound to her, a single thread from her own heart to the center of it. When she returned to her physical body, it should too. And there was only one way to find out.

She sank into herself, feeling herself grow heavy and tired. She was thirsty and her limbs didn't want to obey her as she woke. The veilfire still burned, and the poppy within it. Before she could extinguish the flames, the bright ball of the wisp appeared in the smoke, wreathed in it and absorbing it. It sprang up from the center of the rotunda and became an amorphous humanoid shape, very similar to those she'd known in the years since the Veil fell.

“Hello,” she croaked, barely recognizing her own voice. This was the moment. Had it worked?

“Savhalla,” the spirit said, and her eyes filled with tears. She had not heard his voice in ten years, and here it was. Perfect, sharp and beloved.

“Andaran atish'an,” she whispered. The spirit dipped. She reached for her pack and dragged a waterskin to her mouth to drink deeply before she tried any further communication. “Do you know who you are?”

“Ar shena.” He floated there, and she didn't detect any distress from him. “Ar.. _ea_.”

She gave a soft, gentle laugh. “Well, it's a good start. Will you come with me?”

“Ahnsul?”

“So I can find more of you, more pieces of you.”

“Vin.”

She was shaky on her legs, but she managed to stand. She collected the ashes into a bowl and laid the poppy over them. The spirit hovered at her shoulder, not incurious, but not questioning either. She stumbled and staggered her way to the Great Hall and down the ruin of her former home to the final door, the one that led to the highest chamber. She wasn't particularly looking forward to the climb in her exhaustion, but she knew this would work better without lapses of time between integrations.

“Ma eramah,” the spirit said.

“Yes, but this needs to be done before I sleep, or you will not be whole.”

He said nothing to that and she leaned on the splintered railing and hauled herself up the stairs. Surprisingly, they'd held, and there were no gaps to bridge. She was thankful, since her energy was low and she didn't want to have to spend it on fixing the blighted stairs. They reached the top and she opened the door to her chamber. It looked much the same, although it was dank and dusty. The bed was covered with a sheet and the hearth was empty. It was cold. But it would do.

“All right, I'm going to cross over again, and see what I can find.”

“Ma nuvenin.”

Her heart lurched. The tone was so full of _his_ nuance and presence, and yet it was not him, not yet. All the same, she felt like she'd burst open to hear it. She kept herself from sobbing by sheer force of will and managed to smile at the spirit as she laid out the bowl and poppy. This time she rested against the sofa that still sat before the hearth, giving her body something to lean on. She called the veilfire again, using up nearly all her stores of magical energy to do it. The poppy smoked and she breathed it in and crossed over.

In the Fade, his shape was firmer, more recognizable as a man, an elf. Not so much in the face he wore, but the way he held himself, the way his body conformed to a shape, with its arms behind its back, his feet solidly planted. She smiled as she withdrew from her physical body.

“Hello,” she said again. He turned to her, his face blank but for the impression of eyes and a mouth.

“Are you well?” he asked, and she noted that while he still spoke Elvish, it was easier for her to feel the meaning of the words in the Fade.

“I am, do not be troubled.”

“I am not.”

His energy was strong here, in this spot before the hearth, and she gathered the tendrils, taking her time to weave them together as she had before. It didn't surprise her that he was here too, and she knew most of all what she would find nearer the bed. A single night was all they'd shared there, but they had created a life with it. She was positive a resonance remained. But he needed to be stronger before she integrated that.

“There are many memories here,” he said idly as she worked. She nodded, keeping her mind focused on her task. “I am important to you.”

She paused then, cradling the bundle of emotions and memories to her chest. “Yes, you are.”

She offered the wisp to him to absorb and he took it without moving, sinking the glowing ball of energy within his body and dispersing it into his limbs. He grew more solid and his face began to form. Ellia covered her mouth with her hands to keep her exclamation in. His eyes, they were so bright, but they were _his_.

He blinked at her and the rest of his face formed, right down to the dimple in his chin and the scar above his brow. As the memories settled, freckles blossomed on his cheeks. He stood taller, more confidently. He looked around the room and it seemed he recognized it.

“The...Inquisition.”

“Yes,” she whispered. “Do you...do you remember it?”

“I...yes. There was a breach in the Fade. The Veil...it was torn. I do not...remember why.”

“It's all right, don't rush it. You need more memories to become whole.”

“There was pain. And regret.” He was looking at her again, and the gaze was stark. Afraid.

“It's over now. All of that is over.”

“You have done this before.”

“I have, yes.”

“You should rest. You are fading.”

“Will you be all right while I sleep a little?”

“Yes. I will wait for you.”

Ellia sank back into her body and barely managed to fold herself up onto the sofa before the darkness claimed her. Before she slept, however, she saw him standing there, fully formed although thin, translucent. The way Cole had been in the beginning. He caught her gaze as she slipped from consciousness, and he smiled.

“Sleep,” he said, in the Common tongue. “I will wait.”

***

She was alone when she woke, and she sat up on the dingy sofa, looking around frantically. “Solas?”

He appeared, not far from where he'd stood before. He looked...healthier. Still wan and thin, too stretched to be coherent fully, but he was whole enough to withstand what would come next.

“Pride,” he said. He cocked his head at her, and it reminded her so much of Cole that she thought too late to try and stop him from accessing her mind. “My name is Solas, if there are to be introductions.” His voice dropped, the register and tone different from that fateful day. “I am pleased to see you still live.”

She made a noise, somewhere between a laugh and a sob. She nodded. “Yes.”

He grew more substantial as she watched, as he flipped through her memories of their time together like one might turn the pages of a book. He didn't speak for a long time, but by the time he pulled away, every gesture and expression, every small motion and indeed, his very essence, was there.

“Lavellan. Ellisora. Ellia. _Vhenan_.”

“Yes.”

He looked at his hands, flexing his fingers and turning them over. He made a fist of his left one and held it at an angle, as though he might be pulling on something. When he spoke, it was slow and measured. A jumble of disparate pieces falling into place within him. “Var lath vir suledin.”

Ellia closed her eyes. She felt the other end of the sofa sag as he sat down. She felt his touch on her hand, tentative and light. She turned her palm upwards so he could lay his hand flat on hers, so their fingers could twine together.

“You brought me back,” he said. “Well done.”

**Author's Note:**

> Savhalla – greetings/hello  
> Andaran atish'an – be welcome in peace, a formal greeting  
> Ar shena. Ar..ea. - I am born. I am.  
> Ahnsul? - why  
> Vin. - yes  
> Me eramah – you're tired  
> Ma nuvenin - as you say  
> Var lath vir suledin - our love will endure  
> Courtesy of canon and Fenxshiral's Project Elvhen
> 
> Feedback is, as always, the lifeblood. I reply to every comment.  
> Cheers!


End file.
